Monday, August 30, 2010

No country is free from political corruption, but corruption is far from affecting all countries alike. Every year Transparency International, a Berlin-based NGO devoted to fighting political corruption and spreading information about it, draws a corruption perception index showing the corruption level perceived by businessmen and political analysts in their own countries. The ten most corrupted countries in the world include one from the Caribbean (Haiti), five from Central Asia and the Middle East (Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Iraq and Afghanistan), one from Southeast Asia (Myanmar) and three from Africa (Chad, Sudan and Somalia).

Most countries of northern Europe come out on top as the less corrupted countries, but there are also some surprises: New Zealand ranks number 1 and Singapore ranks number 3.

Within the European Union, Bulgaria, Greece and Romania are the three countries where corruption is perceived to be higher. In Denmark, Sweden and Switzerland, the perceived level of public corruption is the lowest. Spain ranks number 32 in the worldwide list, after such countries as Israel, Cyprus or Chile, and number 18 within the list of the 30 EU countries.